• ! ! ! IMPORTANT MESSAGE ! ! !

    Discussions about police investigations

    In light of recent developments about a player from Premier League being arrested and until there is an official announcement, ALL users should refrain from discussing or speculating about situations around personal off-pitch matters related to any Arsenal player. This is to protect you and the forum.

    Users who disregard this reminder will be issued warnings and their posts will get deleted from public.

General Reserves Talk

  • Thread starter M+D
  • Start date
  • Replies 11,736
  • Views 1,149,848

MutableEarth

Reiss' Dad
Trusted ⭐
Yeah I was impressed with the level of performance from the team, all comfortable in posession. Amaechi didn't have the best of games tonight even though he scored, could definitley see his talent though at times playing on the right and cutting in on his left foot. Hopefully we can get to the final this year
He's had quite a sharp rise in stature to be fair to him, both he and Coyle have drifted out of games this season - I put that down to the long-term injuries they both sustained before the start of the season. Their challenge is definitely sustaining their impact on games.

What was Balogun like? Nobody really says much about him but he's scored heaps this season.
 

Wengysaurus

Well-Known Member
He's had quite a sharp rise in stature to be fair to him, both he and Coyle have drifted out of games this season - I put that down to the long-term injuries they both sustained before the start of the season. Their challenge is definitely sustaining their impact on games.

What was Balogun like? Nobody really says much about him but he's scored heaps this season.
Yeah I think Coyle and Amaechi are quite similar in that you can see they have the quality, it's just about them gaining experience and working out how to be effective in games for longer spells.

Balogun had a good game, work's hard up front on his own and makes very good runs in behind the defence, he was always looking to go at defenders and get shots off. I think possibly similar to Eddie in terms of style of play. Exciting times by the looks of the youth team at the moment anyway.
 

MutableEarth

Reiss' Dad
Trusted ⭐
http://news.arseblog.com/2018/03/fa...twitter&utm_medium=twitter&utm_source=twitter

Nice mention of Vontae Daley-Campbell. Been very solid for U18s this season. We have a surplus of strong attacker so it is nice to see some defenders like him and Ballard mentioned.

This attack hopefully keeps firing at the business end. Real chance of a trophy for these guys if they take it seriously. Tough task to overhaul Chelsea but with our attack, it is not impossible.
 

MutableEarth

Reiss' Dad
Trusted ⭐
https://www.arsenal.com/news/smith-rowe-kevin-de-bruyne-my-inspiration

This is funny given that I probably compared them even before Smith-Rowe started to think about it him self! :D:rolleyes::rolleyes:
Yeah, was interesting that you made the comparison long before it started to become apparent :lol:. I think switching to central midfield has really emphasized their similarities though. Smith-Rowe is more of a dribbler but he's developing an excellent passing range and his ball-striking technique is top tier.
 

Country: Iceland
Yeah, was interesting that you made the comparison long before it started to become apparent :lol:. I think switching to central midfield has really emphasized their similarities though. Smith-Rowe is more of a dribbler but he's developing an excellent passing range and his ball-striking technique is top tier.

Hoping to see AMN Smith-Rowe Willock midfield in the friendlis in the summer. Even in Cariboo next season but that is wishful thinking.

Also I see no reason that the latter two shouldnt be debuted in the league along with DaSilva and Nelson. I mean its just 5-7 minutes cameos. FFS Wenger. :lol:
 

MutableEarth

Reiss' Dad
Trusted ⭐
Hoping to see AMN Smith-Rowe Willock midfield in the friendlis in the summer. Even in Cariboo next season but that is wishful thinking.

Also I see no reason that the latter two shouldnt be debuted in the league along with DaSilva and Nelson. I mean its just 5-7 minutes cameos. FFS Wenger. :lol:
If I were one of these younger players and I had their ability, I'd put in the work to be twice the player and give Wenger no excuse not to pick me. It's not like the talent isn't there.

Look at Josh DaSilva for example. You look at his frame, his technical ability - he could drag a team forward by himself with the right mentality. Joe Willock is similar, but he seems to have a strong mentality himself considering how sharp his rise has been. Either of those guys could elevate themselves to be excellent midfielders. Smith-Rowe is on the right track because he's doing the same thing. Stamping his authority on games, dragging his team forward. He's done it for the U18s and the U23s now.

Nelson should be thinking about doing this aswell. Right now, he wants to be this roaming #10 who gets on the ball and makes things happen, which is great and he can definitely do it as he can marry his busy style of play with creativity and penetration. But I think the younger players should also be looking at the roles they can potential play in their position and how that can be adapted to what the team needs. Nelson's biggest strengths are his pace, dribbling, imagination and shooting. He should instead be thinking like a wide forward - isolating full-backs and beating them 1v1; cutting in to shoot; making runs inside the half-space off the ball rather than coming to the ball etc.

Wenger playing these guys out of position was annoying at first, but I think the lesson that can be valuable out of doing it is simply how well they can adapt their game to a specific role. Now as a manager, it's also important to identify a role that emphasizes the strengths of the player too. Nelson's energy, pace, dribbling and technical quality can be utilized as a wing back, but it severely limits his potentially devastating attacking quality too. There will always be trade offs and you have to decide which ones are important. I would not be against Nelson playing wing back if he wasn't potentially a stronger attacker than the players who were playing ahead of him and failing to perform.

On Smith-Rowe, he is definitely playing himself onto a tour where if he does impress it could lead to first team opportunities next season. He still has time on his side as he will only be 18 and unlike Willock last summer, he has a significant amount of U23 experience now. A good little competition is brewing between Smith-Rowe, Willock and DaSilva for places and luckily all of them are relatively versatile to pursue other roles.
 

HBL

Established Member
Would absolutely love to see 6 or 7 of these guys in our 25 man squad for next season. Something like this would be ideal:

New GK, Cech, Macey
Bellerin, AMN
Kosc , Holding/Mavropanos
New cb, New cb
Nacho, Kolasinac
New dm, Meyer/xhaka
Ramsey, Wilshere, Da Silva/Willock
Mkhi, Nelson
Özil, Smith-Rowe
New winger, Jeff
Auba, Lacazette, Nketiah

Loan one of Da Silva/Willock and Holding/Mavropanos and try to find a championship loan for Sheaf. Get rid of Iwobi, Jeff has a much higher ceiling.
 

nick gould

Well-Known Member
Would absolutely love to see 6 or 7 of these guys in our 25 man squad for next season. Something like this would be ideal:

New GK, Cech, Macey
Bellerin, AMN
Kosc , Holding/Mavropanos
New cb, New cb
Nacho, Kolasinac
New dm, Meyer/xhaka
Ramsey, Wilshere, Da Silva/Willock
Mkhi, Nelson
Özil, Smith-Rowe
New winger, Jeff
Auba, Lacazette, Nketiah

Loan one of Da Silva/Willock and Holding/Mavropanos and try to find a championship loan for Sheaf. Get rid of Iwobi, Jeff has a much higher ceiling.
Come on, no Nelson why?
 

MutableEarth

Reiss' Dad
Trusted ⭐
Our U23s are currently leading Chelsea 2-1 at half time. We've got a pretty strong lineup - Nelson, Nketiah, DaSilva and Willock are all starting - from the tweets I'm reading, game sounds quite even.

Nketiah scored our first, Tyreece John-Jules scored our second with a backheel.

The dot com never fails to disappoint so there's no stream.
 

Country: Iceland
Our U23s are currently leading Chelsea 2-1 at half time. We've got a pretty strong lineup - Nelson, Nketiah, DaSilva and Willock are all starting - from the tweets I'm reading, game sounds quite even.

Nketiah scored our first, Tyreece John-Jules scored our second with a backheel.

The dot com never fails to disappoint so there's no stream.

Do you also feel like in space of two years we have gone from having below decent academy (result wise) to getting at the stage we are probably competing with Chelsea as the best academy in the country?

I think the job has to be admired here what Jonker(can't quite remember his name) and others have done! Ampadu has really impressed me as youth coach!
 

MutableEarth

Reiss' Dad
Trusted ⭐
Do you also feel like in space of two years we have gone from having below decent academy (result wise) to getting at the stage we are probably competing with Chelsea as the best academy in the country?

I think the job has to be admired here what Jonker(can't quite remember his name) and others have done!
In terms of results? There's been a huge improvement - a lot of that to do with the fact that players are sticking to their age group rather than being promoted very early like before. Since Jonker, only a handful like Nelson, Coyle and John-Jules were promoted at 15/16 to U23 football. Most of the players have significant u23 experience now, and even Willock was a seasoned U18 so he had some pedigree moving up this year.

Much has to be said about the coaches. I admittedly never rated Steve Gatting much but since he's had stronger sides to work with, his teams are doing 100 times better. And Kwame Ampadu has done excellent work with the U18s since his appointment - the defence still struggles but they have an identity and play like a unit.

Saying that, I don't think any academy is close to competing with Chelsea in terms of the amount of raw talent across the age groups as well as the results. They have coaches that take the results seriously too. We are getting there, but as good as our U18s have been (if we win our game in hand, we're 6 points behind plus we play them soon), Chelsea's U18s have mowed everyone over. They're a machine. It's criminal that none of these guys get much look in for the 1st team, save for the amazing Callum Hudson-Odoi (would have been a real backlash had he not been integrated yet, such is his talent and form).

Unrelated but apparently Willock assisted John-Jules goal today. That's 5 assists and 1 goal in the last few U23 games for Willock.
 

Country: Iceland
Unrelated but apparently Willock assisted John-Jules goal today. That's 5 assists and 1 goal in the last few U23 games for Willock.

One of the thing people tend to forget when they analyse Willock path to first team football this year is that he is converted attacker, learning midfield position at same time as getting firs tteam football so early can be hard, and also he had very little u23 football before starting playing with the first team.

What is Wenger idea here? Well if he manage to convert Willock to midfielder at top level, his potential as all action midfielder is insane imo.
 

MutableEarth

Reiss' Dad
Trusted ⭐
One of the thing people tend to forget when they analyse Willock path to first team football this year is that he is converted attacker, learning midfield position at same time as getting firs tteam football so early can be hard, and also he had very little u23 football before starting playing with the first team.

What is Wenger idea here? Well if he manage to convert Willock to midfielder at top level, his potential as all action midfielder is insane imo.
Wenger wants to replicate Diaby's blend of power and technique IMO. Has both Willock and Dasilva to play with in that regard. Willock does a lot of smart things for an inexperienced player. Bodes well. Competitive too. Perfect mindset for CM.

It's 3-1 btw. Nelson free kick.
 

Country: Iceland
It's 3-1 btw. Nelson free kick.

Must tie Nelson down. I know the season hasn't gone like we or he wanted but it is still a start and after the season he has overcome the most difficult thing, which is a beginning of a career at top level!

How have we been playing anyway? Winning 3-1 against Chelsea is a good thing and you have to wonder if our players involvement with first team so far this season has given us a little edge for this game!? People talk about loans a lot but just training with the likes of Özil everyday gives so much also!
 

Aevi

Hale End FC
Moderator
Must tie Nelson down. I know the season hasn't gone like we or he wanted but it is still a start and after the season he has overcome the most difficult thing, which is a beginning of a career at top level!

How have we been playing anyway? Winning 3-1 against Chelsea is a good thing and you have to wonder if our players involvement with first team so far this season has given us a little edge for this game!? People talk about loans a lot but just training with the likes of Özil everyday gives so much also!
Rashford recently said he feels like he develops most in training (as opposed to in matches), so that could be true.
 

Latest posts+

Top Bottom